Dan shrugged. ‘What do any couple talk to each other about?’
My heart stung a little at this. Is that how he saw us too, as any couple? Did he see us like his parents, an old married couple with little in common? I didn’t have time to hurt for too long, as he negotiated a tight corner. Too fast.
‘Dan, please slow down,’ I said. ‘The kids are in the back. What’s wrong with you?’
I saw his jaw tighten, but he did slow down.
The drive from the airport at Naples to our villa was, according to the satnav, just over an hour. We’d gone from the bustling city to glimpses of calm, glittery ocean and now we were climbing up the steep hillside past vineyards. Canopies of feathery green leaves in every shade of green played hide-and-seek with the sun.
Between the trees, the sea appeared now and again below us, shimmering in the dusk – how beautiful it was. I remember feeling a rush of excitement for the fortnight ahead. I couldn’t wait to swim with Dan and the children, cook lovely food with Joy, and spend long afternoons all together in the sunshine. Our lives were so busy that this would be a rare chance to talk, spend time with the children, and Dan’s parents too. It was going to be wonderful, just what we all needed. My real priority this holiday was getting Freddie used to water and teaching Alfie to swim.
My dad had taught me to swim in the local baths. We’d go every Saturday afternoon and, one Saturday, on my ninth summer, I swam a whole length. I remember feeling like an Olympian, my feet off the ground, my arms splashing and heaving me forward, Dad cheering me on. The following winter he was killed when his lorry took the wrong turning on an icy road.
Mum never got over my Dad’s death and our lives changed overnight. At nine my childhood ended and I spent the following ten years mopping up her grief, until she died herself. It was cancer, but I knew really it was a broken heart, and at the age of nineteen I was an orphan, alone with no family. Until I met Dan, and the Taylors.
CHAPTER TWO
A little voice from the back of the car suddenly punctured my thoughts. It was Violet, my nine-year-old, who, as the oldest child, was responsible, sensible and slightly anxious. ‘Are we there yet?’ The sunlight caught her long, golden hair as we drove through the trees, and I took a moment to look at her, my little girl was growing up.
‘Not far now, darling,’ Dan said soothingly.
‘Are Granny and Granddad already at the villa?’
‘Yes.’ I turned to smile at her, her fretful little face pale from waking somewhere strange. ‘They arrived yesterday, sweetie. Granny says it’s a lovely villa. Boys, boys.’ I touched Alfie’s leg. ‘Try to wake up, we’re almost there.’
Four-year-old Alfie stirred, still half-asleep, but, at two, Freddie was unable to process waking up in the back of a strange car and started to cry. Alfie told him to ‘Shut up!’ Then Violet told Alfie to ‘Leave him alone,’ and as they began an argument, Freddie’s cries just got louder and louder. Oh, the joy of having three children. When they were excited and happy, it was an overload of wonderful bubbling happiness, but when they were grumpy or tired, they just endlessly ricocheted off each other.
I dreamed of just five minutes’ peace, and the luxury of reading an uninterrupted chapter of a book or the heady prospect of a lone toilet visit, which could make me dizzy with desire.
I turned around to offer calming words to the passengers on the back seat. ‘Not long now! Tell me what you see out of the window?’ I asked, hopefully, and the boys started shouting about trees and rocks. Then Alfie said he’d seen a dinosaur and Violet said he was stupid and another vigorous argument ensued.
‘Good job, Clare,’ Dan laughed.
‘I’d like to see you do better,’ I said and stuck out my tongue, which he caught a glimpse of and smiled at. ‘Come on now, kids, calm down,’ I said gently and, going against all the parenting bloggers’ advice, made vague promises of a swim and ice cream on arrival if everyone behaved. The bickering immediately melted as Violet excitedly told the boys she’d be having ‘strawberry ice cream with sprinkles’。 Alfie suggested ‘mashed frog flavour’ and collapsed into fits of laughter, before Violet informed him, ‘That isn’t a flavour, stupid.’
Smiling, I turned back to look through the window, just as we drove past a gaggle of young women in shorts and realised with a jolt that, at forty-one, I was probably old enough to be their mother. I envied their relaxed, youthful beauty, and all that ‘me time’ we don’t appreciate until we have kids. I was once like them, but now I didn’t even get chance to shave my legs. Long gone were the days of a pre-holiday bikini wax, whole body exfoliation, followed by fake tan and a glam new summer wardrobe. I really should have made time to shave my legs though. I could almost hear Joy’s voice. ‘Good grooming is the best gift a woman can give to herself – and her husband,’ she’d once told me. She’d meant it as a piece of motherly advice, and I loved her for it, but Joy’s advice on marriage was decades out of date. I hoped these days we were evolved enough for our partner’s feelings not to be altered by the state of one’s leg hair growth. I wondered if Dan would even notice my hairy legs. I doubted it, and they weren’t exactly a priority for me either. Whatever Joy’s Stepford advice on a wife’s good grooming, no one died because they didn’t shave their legs or wear lipstick. For the next two weeks, I was going to slob around as much as I wanted, and not waste precious time applying make-up or de-fuzzing my body.